Word of Salvation – Vol.38 No.43 – November 1993

 

Joab’s Call to Bravery and Trust in God

 

Sermon by Rev. M. Geluk on 2 Samuel 10:12

Readings: 2Samuel 10; Ephesians 6:10-20

 

Congregation, beloved in Christ,

Joab, the commander over the army of king David, and his brother Abishai, were called ‘the hard sons of Zeruiah.’  Joab was a man who plotted his own course in life and would not let anyone stand in the way of him realising his own selfish ambitions.  David wore the crown but later on in his reign it became increasingly obvious that it was really Joab who was king.  And yet, Joab was loyal to David, always ready to secure the king’s throne.  He never questioned that David was the Lord’s anointed.  But Joab could easily take matters in his own hands when he felt that David had taken unwise actions.  That’s how he came to murder Abner in cold blood.  Joab felt that David really blew it when he made peace with Abner whom Joab did not trust for one moment.  According to the law of God, David should have punished Joab with death for that murder, but he didn’t.  He did no more than pronounce a curse over Joab.  David’s failure to take firm action against Joab, the murderer, played right into Joab’s hand.  It was the beginning of his hold over David.

However, our text gives us a side to Joab that we perhaps would not have expected.  We will even find ourselves questioning his sincerity, for Abner’s blood was still fresh on his hands.  But, for the moment, let us hear his call to be strong and courageous in the face of a big and dangerous battle.  He said to his brother Abishai, and probably also to his army officers with whom he had discussed his battle plan: ‘Be strong and let us fight bravely for our people and the cities of our God.  The Lord will do what is good in his sight.’  In this text we have: Joab’s call to bravery and trust in God.

1.  The circumstances that led to this call.

We have to go back to the beginning of chapter 10 where we are told that David decided to show kindness to the son of the king of Ammon, a neighbouring country east of Israel.  This king had been a cruel tyrant but, for reasons unknown, he showed kindness to David.  Therefore, when this king died and his son became the next king, David sent a friendly delegation to Ammon, to express sympathy to the son about his father’s death.

You know, of course, that heads of state do this kind of thing because it helps build relationships which later on may prove useful.  David was not planning to place too much trust in this new king of Ammon.  Like the other nations roundabout Israel, Ammon was a pagan people.  There is, of course, nothing wrong with being kind to neighbours and maintaining peaceful relationships.  God even commands that in His Word.

When David’s men arrived in Ammon, however, with their condolences, the country’s nobles made their new king believe that these Israelites were really on a spying mission.  What they did to David’s messengers humiliated them deeply.  They shaved off half their beards, cut off their clothes from the hips down and around the back, thus exposing their rear end.  In this half-naked state they were kicked out of Ammon.

There is a text in Isaiah (20:4) that reveals that Assyria humiliated Egyptian prisoners of war in this manner.  Ammon did it in peace-time to David’s men who had come to pass on the king’s kindness.  You can imagine how David’s men must have felt.  We don’t care much about beards, but in those days a man without a beard wasn’t a real man.  A man with half his beard forcibly removed wouldn’t know where to hide with shame.  And arriving at the palace as an important delegation from Israel, suitably dressed for such an occasion, and then to be put back on the street with the bottom half of your clothes deliberately cut away, well, you would become an object of derision to everyone in the street!  Young louts would shout obscenities at you and girls would snicker at the ridiculous spectacle.

David heard about it, of course.  That was the whole idea!  It was a calculated act to provoke war.  We’re told that the Ammonites became a stench in David’s nostrils.  They expected this and so they mobilised for war, as well as hiring soldiers from Syria to help them fight Israel.

That is how this war started.  May be we think that David over-reacted and should not have straight away sent his troops into battle.  Nowadays we are used to endless diplomacy and negotiations.  But don’t forget that this humiliation of David’s men also insulted God.  Israel was God’s chosen nation.  The Lord had made them the people of His covenant.  He had promised to bless them and keep them.  In and among His people the Lord would show His righteousness, dignity and justice.  It was not only Israel’s king who suffered insult but the king of kings and the Lord of lords.

Israel’s neighbours knew of God’s dealings with His people.  They knew of Israel’s exodus from Egypt, their miraculous survival in the wilderness and their conquest of Canaan.  This humiliation of David’s men was a terrible taunt to Israel’s God who had told His people to tell the world that He was the only true God, the Maker of heaven and earth.  And David, anointed by God to be the king over God’s people, had no choice but to declare war and punish those who dared insult the Lord Almighty.  That was God’s will for Israel’s king.  This was no time for negotiations and to persuade Ammon to please apologise and soften their stand.  In any case, Ammon was in no mood to repent.  Its army had been called up already and another army was hired from Syria, Ammon’s neighbour to the north.

Joab’s battle plan was shrewd but simple.  Israel’s army marched to Rabbah, the capital of Ammon.  There the Ammonite army was waiting in battle formation, right in front of the city gate, presumably ready to withdraw behind the city walls, should that prove necessary.  But behind Joab and to his flank was the Syrian army.  In chapter 10 they are called the Arameans.  Joab realised that if he attacked the Ammonites, then the Syrians would strike him from the rear.  If he went for the Syrians first, then the Ammonites would come up behind him.

So he decided to divide his men and fight on two fronts.  He would use his best troops in launching an all-out attack on the Syrians.  At the same time Abishai would confront the Ammonites.  Being in the middle, Joab could keep the two enemy armies apart and prevent them from knowing how the other was coping but at the same time he was in a position to keep an eye on both fronts.  Should the Ammonites prove too strong for Abishai and his men, then Joab would come to his aid, and if the Syrians were too strong for Joab and his men then Abishai would give him a hand.  Joab did not say what he would do if both enemy armies proved too strong.  As things turned out, Joab routed the Syrians and Abishai forced the Ammonites to withdraw behind their city walls.  The Lord had won this battle for His people.

2.  The words of Joab’s call examined

“Be strong and let us fight bravely for our people and the cities of our God.  The Lord will do what is good in his sight.’

We must admit that these words from Joab to Abishai and the army officers, was stirring stuff.  It was, after all, a critical moment in Israel’s history.  If this battle was lost then the Ammonites and the Syrians would have swept right into their land.  The people in the countryside and in the cities would be massacred.  Joab spoke of the ‘cities of our God.’  Well, he was right.  Israel was God’s covenant people and they had settled and built their cities in the land God had promised them.

Joab, then, was well aware of the relationship God had with Israel.  Why shouldn’t he?  Joab himself, like all the Israelites, was a covenant child.  The stories of God’s dealings with His people would have been told to him also.  Besides, this was the time of David’s reign which was Israel’s golden period.  David was also the poet who wrote moving psalms which spoke of God’s faithfulness.  David was not backward when it came to speaking up and acting in the name of God.  For years David and his warriors had roamed the countryside, trying to stay out of Saul’s clutches, and defending Israel from all kinds of crooks and warlords.  Joab had been part of all that.  Alongside David, Joab had seen and experienced what it was like to depend on God and be delivered by His hand from death time and again.

So why shouldn’t Joab have spoken the way he did when they were about to go into battle against the superior forces of the Ammonites and the Syrians?  After all, his way of speaking was all part of Israel’s life and culture.  The kind of words Joab spoke had been uttered on many occasions by various leaders in Israel.  Listen to what Moses said to all Israel when they were about to enter the Promised Land and wage war against the pagan Canaanites: ‘Be strong and courageous.  Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you or forsake you.’ (Deut.31:6).

Moses’ successor, Joshua, spoke in similar vein: ‘Be strong and courageous, because you will lead these people to inherit the land I swore to their forefathers to give them.  Be strong and very courageous.  Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you go.’ (Joshua 1:6,7 and cf.  vs.9,18).

Later on in Israel’s history, long after Joab and David, another godly king by the name of Hezekiah also spoke similar words, ‘Be strong and courageous.  Do not be afraid or discouraged because of the king of Assyria and the vast army with him, for there is a greater power with us than with him.  With him is only the arm of flesh, but with us is the Lord our God to help us and fight our battles.’ (2Chron.32:7,8).

Later on still, when the Israelites had returned from captivity and were rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem under the leadership of Nehemiah, they heard insults from pagans similar to what David’s men had to endure when they had their beards shaved off and their clothing cut away.  Nehemiah prayed: ‘Hear us, O our God, for we are despised.  Turn their insults back on their own heads.  Do not cover up their guilt or blot out their sins from your sight.  (Neh.4:4).

This kind of language did not only come from the people in Old Testament times.  In the New Testament Paul writes to the Corinthians: ‘Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be men of courage; be strong.’ (1Cor.16:13).

In Hebrews we have this: ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid.  What can man do to me?’ (13:6).  And following that it says: ‘Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you.  Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.’  (vs.7).

So Joab was merely following the good example of Moses, Joshua and David before him.  What he said to Abishai and the army officers in the face of an important battle was what you’d expect from a leader of God’s people.  Many godly people after Joab spoke similar words.

Mind you, similar words have been spoken by pagan leaders as well, without any reference to God, of course.  Some years before Joab’s time, the Philistines were fighting Saul’s men and their generals said: ‘Be strong, Philistines!  Be men, or you will be subject to the Hebrews …  be men, and fight!’ (1Sam.4:9).

Leaders of all kinds want to inspire confidence in their men and build up their courage and strength.  Every sport’s coach does it to his team in intervals and in time-out.  Some leaders and coaches think they can whip up their men into greater effort by swearing and cursing.  Television stations, broadcasting matches live, are now starting to include gutter language.  They think it adds to the excitement.  But what pagans say and what God’s leaders say are two different things.  With pagans it’s swearing and cursing.  But when the lives of God’s people are at stake, then they prayerfully call on the Lord Almighty for help.  As Hezekiah said, with pagans it’s the arm of flesh, but with the Lord’s people it’s the Lord God who is there to help.

So we can only think well of Joab in the way he spoke his words of encouragement.  Note also that he said: ‘The Lord will do what is good in his sight.’  Yes, even a humble Joab.  His word was not only a call to be brave but also a call to trust in God and let the Lord decide the outcome of the battle.  The ambitious Joab who fought his own battles very well committed his life, his army, indeed all of Israel to the will of God.  Marvellous!  Would that all God’s people had that dependent attitude on God.

‘The Lord will do what is good in his sight.’  That attitude showed up on a number of occasions during the time of the Judges.  Israel had gone after false gods and then God disciplined His people by letting pagan oppressors rule them.  When they could bear it no more, the Israelites humbled themselves before God and cried out for deliverance.  They would say to the Lord: ‘We have sinned.  Do with us whatever you think best, but please rescue us now.’ (Judges 10:15).

In a similar way Eli humbled himself when he heard from the boy Samuel how the Lord was going to punish his family for the evil they had done.  Eli said: ‘He is the Lord, let him do what is good in his eyes.’ (1Sam.3:18).

We remember, how Job in deep distress and anguish, because of the loss of his children and possessions, said: ‘The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.’  (1:21).  There is in these words no fatalistic attitude but a willingness to surrender to God’s perfect will.

And now Joab stands alongside all those humble people who believingly and with trust committed their lives to the will of God.  It would seem, then, that there was more to Joab that we thought.  There was a soft spot in that hard man after all.  Are we wrong, then, when we have the impression that Joab was not a man of God?  Just as we can be mistaken about other people we know?  We see their hardness, their ambitious, selfish attitudes, their riding roughshod over other peoples’ lives, and their overall, indifferent behaviour regarding the things of God.  We regard them as hard cases.  But maybe those same people, when they are alone before God, feel bad about the way they are and they say to God: Lord, do with me as I deserve.  I am a terrible sinner.  But in your mercy, Lord, look upon me in your grace.  Forgive me, for Jesus’ sake.

Was Joab sincere in what he said?  That’s really the point, isn’t it?  Did he really mean those words?  Did they come from his heart?  Or was he just making pious statements, borrowed from a number of other leaders in Israel before his time?

It’s probably true to say that Joab was not without faith in God.  He was not an irreligious person.  Much later in his life when David made that sinful mistake of wanting to have a census taken to see how many fighting men he could muster, then it was Joab who pointed to the king that it was a stupid thing to do.  Joab said, ‘May the Lord your God multiply the troops a thousand times over and may the eyes of my lord the king see it, but why does my lord the king want to do such a thing?’ (2Sam.24:3).

Moreover, the Bible has recorded that Joab, like other army commanders, made frequent gifts to the temple of the Lord from all the booty they took in battles (1Chron.26:28).

So Joab was not indifferent about God.  May be no one was, in Israel.  They all belonged to God’s covenant people.  They had all been to the temple.  Most of them prayed and sacrificed regularly.  Just like they did in Jesus’ days.  All of them knew of God.  They were all part of the covenant community.  Just like people belonging to the church today.  They all can identify with the church.  They are all baptised, and most adults have made public profession of faith and go to the Lord’s Supper.  But were they then, and are they now, all sincere?  Are the right words spoken without the people really meaning what they say?

Maybe we will never know whether Joab was genuine in what he said at this time of the battle.  We do know that he murdered Abner and that David had pronounced God’s curse on him.  There is no record in the Bible that Joab ever repented of this vile deed, or of his murder of Amasa which happened later on in his life, nor of his many other callous deeds.

Yes, David also committed a murder and many other terrible sins.  But we know that David deeply humbled himself before God and repented of his sins.  He obeyed God again.  God’s Word has not recorded this about Joab.  Instead, he is known in the Bible as a hard case.  Yes, together with his brother, they were known as ‘the hard sons of Zeruiah’.

3.  The meaning of such a call for us today.

How can we relate this text to Christ our Saviour?  Joab said: ‘Be strong and let us fight bravely for our people …  The Lord will do what is good in his sight.’  Now isn’t this what Christ did!  Of all the leaders and saviours in the history of God’s people, He was by far the strongest and the most courageous.  In fact, Christ was the only one who fought the battle against sin and Satan without shedding the blood of others in some sinful way.  He shed His own blood, so that the sin and guilt of others could be forgiven.  Many times He was tempted by the devil not to go on with His rescue mission of saving sinners.  Remember the Lord’s struggle in Gethsemane; how He wished that the cup of suffering could pass Him by?  But He prayed, ‘Not my will, but Your will be done!’  Yes, Jesus remained faithful to the very end.

When the Lord now says to us: ‘Be strong and courageous,’ then at least we can look up to Him and see how He was all of that.  Some of Joab’s men who knew him well, like Uriah, who later on in another battle was left behind to die by Joab, would not have been too impressed with Joab’s words.  Many a person has been sceptical about a leader whom they couldn’t trust because of that leader’s double standards.  But Christ we can trust!  His leadership is perfect.  He was fully committed.  He went all the way.  He truly gave His life for the troops, so to speak.

But how, then, do we cope with leaders whom we suspect of insincerity?  How do we serve under them when they are over us with their God-given authority?  History is full of such cases.  Soldiers under the command of leaders who were depraved and ungodly, like Hitler, Stalin, and many others.  As you know, many American and Australian soldiers in the Vietnam war became confused, some even lost their mind, when they began to realise that their leaders back home were more interested in playing political games than being genuinely concerned about the men they had sent into battle.  And how do you cope with other figures of authority whose lifestyles are quite different from the nice-sounding words they speak?  Think of some fathers and mothers at home or of some office-bearers in the church.  Because leaders are sinful and sometimes guilty of double standards, do you, therefore, give up on God?  There have always been those who stopped serving the Lord because the leaders and other church members, made such a mess of their Christianity.

There is an alternative to giving up on God.  First, you must know that the Lord will hold responsible those who fail Him.  So leave to God the leaders who are false.  Then pray for them.  After all, we are all sinners and we ourselves have at different times let people down.  Let’s not pretend we are more righteous than the people we despise.  Furthermore, the Lord will continue to work out His purposes in spite of crooked and insincere leaders.  The Lord’s overall concern is the well-being of His people.  Look at the last verse of this chapter 10.  It says: ‘So the Arameans (i.e.  Syrians) were afraid to help the Ammonites anymore.’ (vs.19b).  The end-result belongs to God who sovereignly reigns over peoples and leaders so that He causes them to make decisions which ultimately benefit His church.

Wars are always terrible.  Anyone reading about wars and what atrocities are committed will know that.  But wars, bad as they are, must not confuse the Christian or cause him to lose his mind.  Ever since mankind rebelled against God, people are like boats without a rudder.  They do all sorts of crazy things.  They also wage war.  Through faith in God, people can learn how to be at peace with each other.  Without God they do not know how to do this.  In their selfish ambitions, nations will rise up against each other in order to gain whatever they are after.  All people, Christians included, get caught up in the conflict.

Sometimes nations have to be at war in order to stave off an even greater disaster.  God commanded Old Testament Israel to wage wars for just one reason – to prevent pagans roundabout them from swallowing them up with their wicked ways and false religions.

Christians are always having to fight a spiritual war.  It’s the war against sin and Satan.  Sometimes this kind of war is at the back of actual bloodshed.  But remember always that in all the conflicts and struggles of the ages, God is fighting and overcoming Satan and his evil powers.  We may have to serve under leaders whom we can’t trust but somehow the Lord will win in the end.  Believe that and trust in Christ.

Time and again, Satan will be divided against himself.  The forces of evil will be fragmented and go against each other.  When you see that happening, then remember it is the Lord’s doing.  He is simply preventing Satan from becoming too powerful.  Yes, in all of life’s battles, in all the confusion sown by leaders, remember that in the final analysis the Christian serves only One Master.  The Lord Jesus Christ stands above the noise of battle and we hear His voice in the Word of God.  He alone is the perfect Leader.  He alone will win the battle.  God’s kingdom will come in full.  Do not doubt it!  Do not forget the words of Christ, the Supreme Commander.  He says: Be strong and courageous, fight bravely the Lord’s battle.  The Lord will do what is good in His sight!

AMEN